How to Successfully Migrate from Shopify to WooCommerce?

If you’re considering moving from Shopify to WooCommerce, you’re in the right place.

While Shopify might have been your go-to for setting up your store initially, WooCommerce offers unmatched flexibility, customization, and the ability to optimize for search engine rankings; all of which are crucial as your business scales.

But how exactly do you migrate to WooCommerce from Shopify without a hitch? Don’t worry, we’ve got you covered!

In this guide, we’ll walk you through the step-by-step process of Shopify to WooCommerce migration. By the end, you’ll be all set to launch your new WooCommerce store with ease, equipped with the best e-commerce platforms for your business.

Why You Should Consider Moving from Shopify to WooCommerce for Your Online Store?

Here are a few reasons why you should consider migrating your store from Shopify to WooCommerce. 

Free and Open Source Platform 

The first reason that WooCommerce stands out as a great replacement is its Free access. Unlike Shopify, WooCommerce is an unrestricted software.

WooCommerce gives you endless options to copy, edit, and adapt the source code which is not possible at Shopify as they hold full ownership over their core setup.

Know More: How to Convert Any Website to WordPress

Added Authority Over Your Store 

With great creativity, comes great control and responsibilities. When you switch to WooCommerce, you have total control of your website design. You can go into the details of design and furnish your store as you like.

Moreover, with its seamless integration with WordPress, you can benefit from the SEO practices that help you generate content that is consistent, readable, and of high quality. 

More Room for Flexibility and Creativity 

At Shopify, you have access to limited designs which often leads to common design issues. Whereas, WooCommerce offers you hundreds of designs and themes to choose from for your website.

With WooCommerce you have the power to customize designs and themes and be different from other existing platforms. These themes are highly adaptable and give you the creativity on how to present your store. 

Pricing Factor 

Both WooCommerce and WordPress are free platforms with no additional costs, to begin with. However, you need to pay for a domain name, hosting, or any other extensions based on your needs.

The benefit of WooCommerce is you need not pay extra charges for the extensions that are of no use to your business. On the other hand, Shopify asks for monthly subscriptions, advance plans for any add-ons, and additional fees for external payment getaways for your business. 

WooCommerce gives you extra control over pricing and payment methods with added flexibility and customizations as per your requirements. 

Scalability for Growing Businesses

With WooCommerce, you can easily manage multiple WooCommerce stores and you’re not limited by monthly subscription plans or external restrictions.

You can easily expand your store, add more products, and integrate third-party solutions, while keeping complete control over how your store evolves. Shopify, on the other hand, often requires upgrading to higher plans for better features or increased capacity.

Full Ownership and Data Control

One of the major reasons businesses choose WooCommerce over Shopify is the control it offers over your store data. With WooCommerce, all your customer data, product information, and order history are under your control.

Shopify, however, restricts access to your store data and may charge you extra fees to access certain types of reports. By migrating to WooCommerce, you gain the freedom to manage and secure your data without external restrictions.

Know More: How to Migrate from OpenCart to WooCommerce

What Essential Data Can Be Migrated from Shopify to WooCommerce?

When you’re ready to migrate from Shopify to WooCommerce, one of the first questions that likely comes to mind is: What data can I bring over? Let’s dive into what you can expect during this migration process, and how you can keep your website running smoothly.

Product Data

The core of your online store revolves around products. Fortunately, all essential product data can be moved seamlessly:

• Product Information: This includes titles, descriptions, and SKUs.
• Product Variations: Sizes, colors, and any other variation you offer.
• Product Prices: All your product prices will be transferred, ensuring no surprises for your customers.
• Product Images: Images attached to your products, including the main product image and additional ones.
• Product Categories and Tags: Maintain the structure of your store with the appropriate categories and tags for each product.

To bring over all this data, you’ll typically use the WooCommerce Product Importer or a specialized WooCommerce migration plugin. These tools will help ensure that product images and variations are correctly linked, so your new WooCommerce site mirrors your Shopify store.

Find Out: Best WooCommerce Product Table Plugins

Customer Data

Your customers are the lifeblood of your e-commerce store, so transferring their customer data securely is critical:

• Customer Information: Names, addresses, and emails will be migrated.
• Customer Order History: This includes their previous purchases, so they don’t lose their shopping history when they move to your new WooCommerce store.
• Customer Passwords: While passwords can’t always be migrated directly for security reasons, there are ways to guide your customers to reset their passwords once the migration is complete.

Don’t forget: When migrating customer data, data security is a top priority. Always use a migration service that ensures your customers’ information stays protected throughout the migration process.

Want to create your WooCommerce dashboard to match your business needs? Dive into our step-by-step blog and discover how to customize a WooCommerce dashboard that works for you. Start customizing today!

Orders and Order Status

Preserving the integrity of your order data is crucial. Here’s what you can move:

• Order Status: Ensure the status of each order (like “Processing,” “Completed,” or “Pending”) is migrated.
• Order History: This includes detailed information about past purchases, shipping addresses, and payment methods.
• Shipping Methods: Your shipping methods and any associated costs will transfer, ensuring a consistent experience for your customers.

Maintaining the order status and shipping methods is essential for keeping your business running smoothly after the migration.

Store Settings

Your store settings; everything from tax rates to shipping zones can be transferred to your WooCommerce site. This ensures consistency in your WooCommerce store:

• Tax Settings: Set up the same tax rules on your new WooCommerce site based on your location and customer base.
• Shipping Methods and Rates: Migrate your shipping methods (flat rate, free shipping, etc.) and rates so that shipping charges remain accurate.
• Currencies: Maintain the same currency settings for customers based on your region or the markets you serve.

Product Reviews and Ratings

Reviews are a great way to build trust with your customers. When you migrate Shopify to WooCommerce, you can transfer:

• Product Reviews: Customer feedback on your products will move with you, keeping your products’ reputation intact.
• Star Ratings: If your products have star ratings, these will also transfer over to your WooCommerce store.

Check Out: How to Build Trust with Clients in A Remote Working Setup

Metadata Migration

Your metadata is crucial for SEO. You’ll want to bring over:

• Meta Descriptions: These are the snippets that appear in search engine results. Maintaining these helps preserve your search engine rankings.
• Meta Titles: Like descriptions, these help with search engine optimization (SEO) and ensure your WooCommerce site continues to rank well after migration.
• Product Attributes: Color, size, material; anything you used to help customers search and filter products.

Shopify URL Structure and Redirects

One of the most important aspects of Shopify to WooCommerce migration is maintaining your Shopify URL structure and setting up redirects. This ensures that:

• SEO Rankings: You don’t lose your hard-earned search engine rankings.
• 301 Redirects: Set up redirects from Shopify URLs to corresponding WooCommerce URLs to prevent broken links and fix 404 errors.

Also Know: Guide to Create a Headless WooCommerce Site

Discounts, Coupons, and Gift Cards

If you’ve offered discounts or gift cards on your Shopify store, you’ll want to bring this over to your new WooCommerce site:

• Discount Codes: Any active or past discount codes can be transferred over.
• Coupons: The same goes for coupons and promotional offers, so your customers can continue using them.

Product Inventory (Stock Levels)

Your stock levels and inventory data will be transferred, so you don’t end up overselling products or running into stock errors. Make sure that:

• Stock Quantities: The number of available units for each product is accurately reflected in your new WooCommerce store.
• Backordered Items: Items that are out of stock or backordered can be properly marked for your customers.

Shipping Methods and Rates

Preserving your shipping methods and rates from your Shopify store is essential for providing a seamless customer experience. During migration, you’ll move:

• Flat Rate Shipping: If you use flat-rate shipping, the same setup will be imported into WooCommerce.
• Real-time Carrier Calculations: If you integrate with carriers like UPS or FedEx, ensure this integration is set up correctly in WooCommerce.

Interesting Read: List of Free WooCommerce Themes for Your Online Store

Step By Step Guide on How to Migrate from Shopify to WooCommerce  

Here are the essential steps to smoothly migrate from Shopify to WooCommerce and get your WooCommerce store up and running. Follow this guide to ensure a seamless transition and retain all your critical Shopify data during the migration process.

Step 1: Set Up and Optimize Your WordPress Website and Quickly Install WooCommerce

Before you begin the migration from Shopify to WooCommerce, you need a solid foundation for your new online store. Start by choosing a reliable hosting provider that supports WooCommerce and installing WordPress on your server. Once WordPress is installed, it’s time to add the WooCommerce plugin, which transforms your WordPress site into a fully functional e-commerce store.

Steps to Start With:

• Choose a Reliable Hosting Provider:
  • Select a hosting provider that supports WordPress websites and offers excellent performance, scalability, and security for your WooCommerce store.
  • Some popular hosts include DreamHost, Hostinger, and Kinsta.
• Install WordPress:
  • Follow your host’s instructions to install WordPress on your new server.
• Install and Activate the WooCommerce Plugin:
  • Once WordPress is set up, go to the Plugins section in your WordPress dashboard.
  • Search for WooCommerce and install the plugin to begin building your WooCommerce store.

Read More: How to Setup WooCommerce Bookings

Step 2: Export Existing Products and Data from Shopify

Now that you’ve set up your WordPress website, the next step is to gather your existing store data from Shopify. You need to export all relevant information such as products, customers, and orders. This is done through CSV files, which act as the bridge for transferring your data to WooCommerce.

Steps for Export:

• Export Shopify Product Data:
  • Log in to your Shopify account, then go to Products and click on Export to export your products as a CSV file.
  • This CSV file will include all relevant product information such as product price, product variations, and product images.
• Export Customer and Order Data:
  • Similarly, export your customer data and order data from Shopify. This is crucial to ensure your customer data and their past orders are intact after the migration.
  • Download a Shopify CSV file for customers and orders, and ensure it includes important information like order status, shipping methods, and order history.
• Export Other Store Data:
  • You can also export any other store data that is essential, like shipping settings, payment methods, and tax configurations.

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Step 3: Import Your Shopify Data into WooCommerce

Now comes the part where you bring your Shopify store to life in WooCommerce. To import your data into WooCommerce, you can use the WooCommerce Product Importer, which will allow you to upload the CSV file containing your products, customer details, and order data.

Steps for Import:

• Use the WooCommerce Product Importer:
  • Go to your WooCommerce store and navigate to Products > All Products. Here you’ll see an option to import products.
  • Upload the CSV file you exported from Shopify to start the import process for your Shopify products into WooCommerce.
  • Make sure to import important product details such as product price, product variations, and product images.
• Utilize WooCommerce Migration Plugins:
  • For a seamless migration process, you can use plugins like Cart2Cart, to WooCommerce, or WooCommerce Shopify Migration Plugin.
  • These plugins allow you to automatically migrate your Shopify products, customer data, and order details without manual effort.
• Check Product Data:
  • After importing, check your products to ensure that all information, like product IDs, prices, and product images, has been imported correctly.

Read More: WooCommerce vs Shopify: Who Wins

Step 4: Preserve Order IDs and Customer IDs

It’s essential to preserve your order IDs and customer IDs during the migration process to maintain continuity. This helps your customers retain their order history, and you can easily reference their past transactions. Look for migration plugins that offer ID mapping features to preserve this data integrity.

Steps for Data Integrity:

• Preserve Order and Customer IDs:
  • Ensure that order IDs and customer IDs are properly mapped and transferred. This is crucial for maintaining your customer’s purchase history and continuity of orders.
• Use Migration Tools with ID Mapping:
  • Some migration plugins, like WooCommerce migration plugins, provide ID mapping options to ensure the customer IDs and order IDs remain the same after migration.

Explore: Best WooCommerce Plugins

Step 5: Migrate Your Shopify URL Structure and Set Up Redirects

One of the most critical steps in the Shopify to WooCommerce migration process is ensuring your Shopify URL structure is maintained and setting up redirects. This ensures you don’t lose your hard-earned search engine rankings and that your existing customers can still find your products and pages seamlessly.

Here’s how to manage this crucial step:

• 301 Redirects:
  • Set up 301 redirects to ensure that your Shopify URLs automatically redirect to the corresponding WooCommerce URLs. This will prevent broken links and help maintain your SEO rankings.
• Maintain Shopify URL Structure:
  • Ensure the Shopify URL structure (product pages, collection pages, etc.) is mapped to the WooCommerce URLs to avoid SEO issues.

Check Out: How to Convert PSD to Shopify with Ease

Step 6: Set Up and Configure WooCommerce Settings

Now that you’ve successfully migrated your products, orders, and customer data from Shopify to WooCommerce, it’s time to fine-tune your new store’s settings. Proper configuration ensures a smooth shopping experience for your customers and a streamlined management process for you.

Let’s break down the key settings you need to address when setting up your WooCommerce store:

• Configure WooCommerce Store Settings:
  • Set up key features in WooCommerce, including payment gateways, shipping methods, tax rules, and store addresses.
• Test Payment and Checkout Pages:
  • Test the checkout page to ensure that the payment gateways are working smoothly.
  • Ensure shipping methods and order status are correctly set up.

Step 7: Redesign Your WooCommerce Store

After you’ve successfully set up your WooCommerce store and everything is running smoothly, the next step is to make the store truly reflect your brand’s personality and vision. This is where you can add your unique touch to your e-commerce site, enhance its functionality, and create a visually appealing shopping experience for your customers.

• Choose a Theme:
  • Select a WooCommerce-compatible theme that suits your brand. There are both free and premium themes available.
• Customize Store Appearance:
  • Add custom design features like banners, sliders, and widgets that enhance the functionality and aesthetics of your new WooCommerce store.
• SEO Optimization:
  • Optimize your WooCommerce site for search engine optimization (SEO). Set up clean URL structures, optimize product descriptions, and make sure metadata migration is completed to maintain good SEO standings.

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Step 8: Launch Your WooCommerce Store

After all the hard work of migrating your Shopify store to WooCommerce, configuring your settings, testing functionality, and ensuring that everything is in place, the final step is launching your WooCommerce store. This is where you get to open the doors to your new e-commerce site and start attracting customers.

• Ensure Data Security:
  • Before launch, double-check data security protocols and ensure sensitive information like customer data and payment data is safely handled.
• Launch Your WooCommerce Store:
  • Announce your new WooCommerce site to your customers and make sure everything is functioning smoothly for your online store’s official launch.

Need Professional Help to Migrate Your Website from Shopify to WooCommerce? 

Migrating from Shopify to WooCommerce can be a complex task, especially when managing large amounts of data, maintaining SEO, and customizing your new store. While our step-by-step guide provides a clear roadmap, the process can still feel overwhelming.

That’s why our Shopify to WooCommerce migration services are here to help. From seamlessly transferring product data, orders, and customer information to preserving your Shopify URL structure and ensuring your SEO rankings remain intact, we handle it all with precision.

Contact Us today and take your online store to new heights with WooCommerce. 

Frequently Asked Questions on Shopify to WooCommerce Migration